Ingenuity can no longer fly to Mars. The NASA helicopter is too damaged. Before abandoning it forever, the Perseverance rover took one last photo of its little companion.
A small car falls asleep, somewhere in the solar system. NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter will never fly on Mars again. The robot, which was circling near the Perseverance rover, is pinned to the ground. The aircraft was too damaged by its last flight (the 72nd) to hope that it would take off again. The rover will therefore have to leave it where it landed. Before leaving him irrevocably, Perseverance captured one last photo of her companion.
The raw image was taken by the rover on February 4, 2024 on Mars. The next day she was shared on X by Simeon Schmauß, design student at the University of Applied Sciences in Munich, who reworked the photo. “ The image has been enlarged 2 times and colors processed to approximately match what the human eye would see, explains Simeon Schmauß. There appear to be marks in the ground next to Ingenuity, these were likely created by the impact of the rotor blades. »
Clues to the Ingenuity Mars crash scenario
For his part, the doctor in planetology Thomas Appéré, who also worked on the Ingenuity photo, focuses on a detail which could provide information on the crash scenario. “ It is possible that this light spot corresponds to the end of one of the blades which broke “, he notes.
In another tweet, Simeon Schmauß zooms in on Ingenuity’s image of Mars. We can thus appreciate even better this shot of the helicopter, motionless in the middle of the undulations of the sand in the Neretva valley. “ Ingenuity stopped on a fairly steep slope. It is possible that it rolled over and the blades hit the ground during landing “, REMARK the design student.
Why isn’t NASA trying one last flight?
Given the astonishing robustness of the Martian helicopter, which far exceeded expectations, one might wonder why NASA is not attempting one last flight, if only to see what will happen. As underlines it the scientific mediator Pierre Henriquet on X, that would not be of much use. Worse, it could even endanger Perseverance’s mission. “ What is the use of dispersing fragments of carbon fiber everywhere at high speed which, in addition, given the low Martian gravity and the low atmospheric pressure, would risk hitting the rover not far away? »
We must therefore resolve, Ingenuity’s mission on Mars is over. And this image is undoubtedly the last memory of the Martian helicopter.
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